02 April 2013 5:58 PM

BBC news does not need a touch on the tiller. It needs an axe

THE BBC is rarely harsh in
judgement on itself, and the welcome its news outlets have given to the arrival
of the new director general has been firmly in line with tradition.

I listened to the
Corporation’s flagship radio news programme, which had a discussion on the
matter. Taking part were one presenter, one former chairman of the BBC, and a
distinguished former editor of Newsnight, who later went on to lead the
advertising-funded BBC World News channel.

When she left it
two or three years back, she was able to make the proud claim that it ‘got very
close to break even’.

What happens to
a corner shop, a plumbing business, or a privately-run television station that
gets very close to break even? If you wish to post your answer, the Today
Programme takes comments too, 1,000 characters maximum.

It is possible
to listen to this stuff and take away the impression that the BBC doesn’t think
much of outsiders. It seems you must have the deep understanding of the
Corporation and its values that can be gained only from working for it before
you can be allowed to discuss its affairs.

Reverence for
that special understanding of the BBC applies in particular to its leadership.
You will not need to be reminded that the new director general, Tony Hall, or
Baron Hall of Birkenhead to the likes of us, joined the BBC in 1973, straight
out of Oxford, and stayed there for nearly three decades.

He quit to get
more experience of the gritty side of life as chief of the Royal Opera House
before going back to the top job.

We must be fair
to Lord Hall. He has already hired a troubleshooter as ‘director of strategy
and digital’ to help ‘define the BBC and public service broadcasting for the
next decade.’

Who is this new
broom? It’s James Purnell, former Labour Culture Secretary, whose experience of
digital culture includes the use of new technology by a hospital to paste his
image into a picture of a promotional event at which, unfortunately, he could not
be present.

Has Mr Purnell
ever worked for the BBC? You don’t need me to tell you, do you? Head of
Corporate Planning, 1995-97.

The consensus
among these worthies appears to be that to secure the BBC’s future a touch on
the tiller may be necessary, possibly involving its news coverage.

And who better
to give an opinion on that than our former Newsnight editor and World News
chief, Sian Kevill?

Long before
the days of Jimmy Savile and Lord McAlpine, Miss Kevill was the Newsnight
editor who responded to the Cabinet resignation of Peter Mandelson by staging
an on-air discussion involving a Labour cabinet minister, a former Mandelson
aide, and a Mandelson friend. How we all laughed, except the usual carpers
going on about a one-party state.

May I make an
alternative and slightly more radical suggestion for the future of the BBC?

BBC news does
not need a touch on the tiller. It needs an axe. It is smug, self-regarding,
sloppy and overwhelmingly biased. It failed to report 15 years of mass
immigration despite the deep concern of its audience; it has been unforgivably one-sided
over the climate change scare and still is; it has for 20 years tried
ceaselessly to paint Eurosceptics as flat-earthers, and it has failed in that
too.

Fortunately, we
have a model for what to do with a monopoly public corporation that has become
too big, is run entirely by its own insiders, and which throws away vast sums
of public money. Let’s ask ourselves, what would Dr Beeching do if, instead of
prescribing the future of British Railways in 1963, he was made chairman of the
BBC in 2013?

The railways
were losing around £1.3 billion a year in modern money in 1963. The BBC licence
fee alone now raises £3.5 billion a year. Room there, I think, for a little
Beeching-style rationalisation.

So, let’s think
about cutting a few little-used branch lines. How about shutting BBC Three and
merging BBC Two and BBC Four? The new chairman should also close a number of
radio stations with small audiences. If the private sector wants to take them
over, fine. Otherwise, pull up the tracks.

That awful
website can go, except for a skeleton news service and replays of broadcast
programmes. All the local radio stations should go to independent owners, in
the cause of breaking monopoly and developing, what is that word the BBC loves?
Oh yes, diversity.

Radio One surely
has to be sold off. It is hard to believe that over the past 45 years private
owners could have done worse with the spiritual home of Jimmy Savile. I would
have spared Radio Two, but, since we now know its listeners think the best
album ever is by Coldplay, closure would be merciful.

The remaining
mainline broadcast channels would be ruthlessly held to their public service
commitments. This would mean an end to phone-ins on Radio Three and, just
possibly, popular entertainment might become better and more popular.

BBC news
programmes love to quote people who say they want to pay high taxes to secure a
better NHS, higher benefits and so on. Well, I would be happy to continue to
pay my licence fee, as long as in future half of it went towards restoring
railway links to places like Padstow, Aldeburgh and Hawick.

There are those
who argue that the Beeching closures saved the railways. I cannot say if they
are right, but slicing up a quarter of the BBC would do the Corporation nothing
but good.

In Beeching’s
day, governments loved to close railways, just as they love to nurture the BBC
now. Closing the railways was, however, one of the most unpopular acts of the
state in a century. I suspect cutting back the BBC would cheer us all up no
end.

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In answer to Alan's comment. Scientific opinion regarding man-made global warming dangers from CO2 emissions is certainly not unanimous. Read Professor Rob Carter's book for some genuine scientific information, and for a brilliant journalistic summary, try James Delingpole's 'Watermelons'. This book exposes the BBC's amateur and shoddy behaviour over man-made global warming.

It would be nice as a Leicestershire lad living in California to find out what is going on in the World from the BBC
Unfortunately the outright corruption and political bias at the Beeb makes it an embarassment.
If anyone is thinking of forming a mob with pitchforks to march on the Beeb and demand an end to the outrage of the poll tax funding please let me know.
I will be glad to buy my own ticket to come over and join in.

Having just re-established the fact that the BBC is the most popular news (as opposed to newspaper) website in the world, Mr Doughty's suggestion would actually remove a really good "advert" for Great Britain across the planet. And the DM accuses the BBC of "running down" the country.........

Why not contract out the provision of news services to the BBC. I'm sure somebody like Reuters can provide better and more cost effective news coverage. By inserting an impartiality clause it would solve the problem of loony left bias.

The BBC is commendably balanced and neutral in it's news reporting, particularly so the Today program. I recall when working abroad that it was often the only news source that foreign nationals felt they could rely on for accuracy and neutrality. I also believe the BBC licence fee is excellent value. It's some time since I have read such a twisted and paranoid article.

I watch BBC News regularly and listen to Radio 4 news programmes on a daily basis as well and I do not notice this consistent bias that the Daily Mail is always bleating about. For real bias try Fox News, right wing enough to satisfy any Daily Mail reader!

Your claim that the BBC " has been unforgivably one-sided over the climate change scare" is like saying that it "has been unforgivably one-sided over the round Earth/flat Earth argument". When climate scientists and all major scientific bodies are unanimous about a scientific topic it would be silly to give credence to opposing claims merely for the sake of "balance".

3.5 billion a year is 35 billion pounds a decade, which is a lot of hospitals and life-saving operations in the poor world. In fact, it's the size of a national bank bailout. That is how much of your money is stolen under force of law and thrown at this media enterprise dedicated to promoting leftwing views.

In a recent straw poll on another media outlet (not The Guardian!) well over half the respondents thought that the BBC was either unbiased or biased to the right, so the truth of your basic premise is subject to some doubt.
But you really give the game away by the suggestion that the web site (the most visited news website in the world, I believe) should be shut down. Only with the removal of this website will newspapers be able to succesfully charge for their poor (in comparison) offerings, and that, in the end, is why there is this campaign against the BBC. The "free press" is fine, so long as it is not "free".
Given that we pay for all the advertising throughout the media - and therefore we all pay towards the media whether we "consume" it or not, none of the press is "free" - in either sense of the word.

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